Tag Archives: sewing for kids

When the Modkid Vivian Shirt Dress and Nightgown pattern went into testing. I asked Little Bit if she was interested in the pattern and if she’d like a dress or a nightgown. She immediately responded she wanted a cheetah print nightgown. Turns out finding cheetah print flannel was more difficult than I thought, so after much negotiations at the fabric store, we walked away with these adorable winter puppy dogs.

I’m not sure who is happier with the results of this sew. Little Bit has declared it her favorite nightgown and I’m super happy with the way it sewed up.

Modkid patterns are always a joy to sew. The PDF pattern pieces assemble easily and the pieces fit together so well. These sleeves are probably the best sleeves I’ve put on and I love the way they came together. Even with all the button holes, this is a quick sew with great results.

Today I’m sharing a fun pair of My Little Pony Freestyle Harem Capris I made for the EYMM Blog Tour. Make sure you check out the links below to the other ladies on the tour and their fabulous creations.

This is the first summer Little Bit hasn’t been in a year round program and we’ve had some flexibility on how she spends it. Her weeks will be split between summer camp at her school (where they are required to wear the camp t-shirt everyday) and various camps at her dance studio where the dress code varies from leotard and tights to comfortable clothing depending on the camp of the week. I sewed up a pair of EYMM Freestyle Harems to add to the bottom heavy summer wardrobe she’s going to need.

These will be perfect for the dance studio with lots of freedom of movement and a fun addition to her summer camp uniform.

Little Bit is currently at the upper end of size 5s, so I went ahead and made her size 6s so they should last her through the summer and into next fall.

I have another pair of long pants cut out in black knit that I need to sew up as well. I can definitely see these becoming a staple of her wardrobe.

Make sure to check out the rest of the Freestyle Harems Blog Tour during the next week. (Note: The links below won’t be live until their scheduled date.)

The last part of last year got away from me and I didn’t blog any projects — not even Halloween. I’ll have to go back and update some of my favorite ones.

Moving on to this year, Violette Field Threads Give Hope Campaign was the perfect project to start the year with.

What’s this all about? Violette Field Threads, one of my favorite pattern companies (I have a lot of favorites), created three free patterns as a thank you to their fans — The Lola top (Free with code in their FB group), the Evie Shorties (Free with code in the FB group or listed on their give Hope blog post), and the Hope Dress and Tunic (which is free with a $2.50 donation to the campaign).

Throughout the month of January, VFT was accepting donations of Lolas, Evies, and Hopes to send to the children at Casa Guatemala. So Little Bit and I made a Hope dress that should eventually make it to a little girl around Little Bit’s age in Guatemala. We have a hope dress planned for little bit as well, but that keeps getting pushed to the back burner with other projects.

I didn’t think to take decent pictures, before we packed up the dress and sent it on it’s way, but here’s a few cell phone pics and a fun clip of the excellent twirl factor this dress has.

I’m excited to share a tutorial for adding a mane and ears to a hoodie or hat. For this tutorial I’m going to use the Happy Homemade Sew Chic Kids Hoodie, but this tutorial should be generic enough to use for just about any hat or hoodie. My initial thought was to use the hat in the Oliver + S Little Things to Sew book, but my design director (aka preschooler decided she would prefer a hoodie at the last minute).

Supplies

First thing you’ll need is to gather your supplies:

Your pattern of choice and all of it’s required supplies

Yarn the color (or colors) you want to use for your mane. When choosing a yarn keep in mind the texture and density, the yarn we ended up choosing for this tutorial is a thin, dense yarn that required more to achieve the fullness of the mane and ended up being rather on the heavy side. In the past we’ve used lighter, fuller yarn that has provided better results in my opinion.

Index card or other thin item approximately 3-3.5 inches.

Scissors.

Ear Template. You can find a template to use as an ear pattern or you can create you own. Searching for <animal type> ear pattern will usually get you what you need. For this tutorial, I used this critter ear template and have self drafted ears in the past.

Steps

Make the Hair For Your Mane

Take you index card and start wrapping the yarn around it to create a group of “hair.” Use another piece of yarn to tie the loops together; this is similar to making a pompom, just less full. Depending on the fullness of the yarn you are using, the number of wraps per group will vary — the rainbow yarn was 20 wraps per group, while a fuller yarn used around 15.

Continue this process until you have enough hair for your mane.

Cut Out Pattern Pieces and Mark Mane Location

After you’ve cut our your pattern pieces, make any necessary marks for designating the position of your mane. I wanted my maine to be around 2.5 inches wide, so while my pattern pieces were still flat, I marked 1.75″ inches in from each side (1.25″ on each half of the hood and .5″ for the seam allowance). Wanting to keep the hair out of the seam allowance I also marked off those areas.

Assemble Outside of Hood

I’ve opted to line my hood; I want to add the mane at this point before continuing with assembly. If you are not lining your hood or hat you can continue with assembly and add the mane afterwards.

Add Mane

Next, you want to add your hair groupings to your hood. Depending on the fabric you are using there is a couple of ways to do this. For the knit hooding I’m making, I found it easier to sew the groupings to the hood. For fleece, I’ve pushed the yarn ends through the fleece and tied the yarn on the inside.

As you’re attaching the yarn, you’ll want to stagger your groupings. Your spacing will vary depending on the type of yarn you’re using and the size of your bundles.

Find a model and try on your headpiece to see if you are happy with coverage and placement; tweak as necessary.

Ears

Cut and assemble your ears and then find a model to determine ear placement. *If you are lining your hood or have not completed hood assembly, remember the front seam allowance is still visible so keep that in mind or tuck it under to avoid placing ears too far forward.

After you determine ear placement, attach ears to hood.

Continue with Garment Assembly

Now is the time to add the lining to your hood and finish the remainder of your garment.

** Make sure to check seams are clear of mane and ears before sewing.

Styling Your Mane

Now that the garment is finished, it’s time to style your mane. Trim up any straggly pieces of yarn. You can leave the yarn looped for a more curly mane or you may cut apart the loops for a straighter mane.

Now you should have a finished garment complete with mane and ears. My design director has determined we are not done with this project and has requested the addition of wings and a tail.

Details

Patterns

Pattern S in Happy Homemade Sew Chic Kids. I picked this pattern because I made it during a sew along and knew it would look good in knit.

Rainbow yarn from JoAnns. After we had picked out the appropriate red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple yarns, my design director spotted this rainbow yarn and decided it would work for Rainbow Dash.

Modifications

I added additional length to the top front of the hoodie because I remember it being a bit shallow during the sew along. I also remember it being pointy so I rounded it out a bit as well.

Notes

The biggest disappointment was the selected yarn and the amount needed to create a full mane. We’ve had better success with other yarns.

Have you heard? Everything Your Moma Made & More is celebrating 2 years! This is my first time participating in a blog tour and I’m so excited to be part of this one. Check out the end of this post for a link to all the blogs on tour, a discount code, and a chance to win some fabulous prizes!

Join EYMM and 24 fellow bloggers as we celebrate the first 24 months of our pattern shop with a huge sale and giveaway! We will be featuring 8 different patterns for women and girls, as well as having a Manic Monday sale and a huge site-wide sale. There is also a great giveaway at the bottom of this post. Don’t wait because you don’t see sales like this often from EYMM and it will be over before you know it!

EYMM has some fantastic patterns and I’ve loved everything I’ve made from them. EYMM’s Piko Top was the first pattern I purchased for myself. And their every day essentials pattern has been used for some of my favorite night gowns. But today I’m going to show some of my recent projects from EYMM.

Calla Lily Skirt

First up is the Calla Lily Skort pattern for girls. This was such a quick and easy sew (even more so when you leave off the shorts). The hardest part of this skirt was the fabric I used. Little Bit saw this fabric on a trip to Jo-Anns about 6 months ago and it’s been sitting in my stash wondering how to use it with all the sequins. It actually sewed up better than I was expecting, but the needle would shift left or right when it hit the sparkles.

I left off the shorts portion as I thought this would be the perfect thing to thrown on over a Leotard after dance or gymnastics and can sill be worn with shorts underneath.

Next up is the Four Seasons Cardigan and Duster pattern which like all the others in this post is available in women’s and kids sizes. Both Little Bit and I have a tendency to be cold in public spaces that have A/C blasting in the summer yet we both aren’t huge fans of long sleeves, so for both of us I opted for the 3/4 sleeves.

Four Seasons Cardigan

I made mine in a light weight hacci sweater knit which should be the perfect weight for wearing around my office.

Four Seasons Cardigan

Little Bit’s is made out of a medium weight stripped knit that should warm her up nicely in cold spaces this summer and transition nicely into her wardrobe for fall. Hers I added a hood to because well, hood are fun.

Capsule Skirt

Lastly, is the newly released Capsule skirt. Which will probably become a staple in both of our wardrobes. It’s such an easy skirt to wear and has the bonus of having the option of hidden side seam pockets. Little Bit had a Knights and Princess theme day at camp, so the night before I was able to whip up this skirt in less than an hour. I opted out of the pockets for this sew, but will definitely include them in the future.

One of the things I love about EYMM patterns is the size range that is included — kids NB – 18 or women’s XS-5X, and they often have bundle pricing for those patterns available for both girls and women. The patterns go together easily and the results are fantastic.

Happy Anniversary to Everything Your Mama Made & More! Thank you for including me in your blog tour.

Four Seasons Cardigan Pattern Details

This was the first time I worked with hacci and it was enough of a challenge for me to cut that I wasn’t even going to try for matching the stripes. It turned out to be easier than I was expecting and this is the perfect thing to grab when there is a chill in the air.

Not only is there an AMAZING blog tour going on but 1 lucky winner that leaves a comment below between now and 8.3.15 will win a FREE EYMM pattern of their choice!!!! Which one would you pick?

Then hop on over to EYMM to check out the awesome SALE, and an even bigger celebration giveaway with over $1000 in prizes. There will be 40 winners in all.

Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, we will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, we only recommend products or services we believe will add value to our readers.

In a first for me, I’ve got a guest post/tutorial on the Crafting Con website. It’s for a My Little Pony inspired hoodie tutorial. This month is all about My Little Ponies so I’m looking forward to seeing everyone else’s posts for inspiration. Little Bit is loving MLP right now, so I’m getting lots of requests for My Little Pony related items.